Category Archives: Co Kerry

Last weekend, we took advantage of the continuing good weather, popped Misty and Newbie into the horsebox and headed to Fermoyle Beach. While there wasn’t glorious sun, it was warm and calm and we virtually had the beach to ourselves.

Fermoyle Beach, Co Kerry, Ireland.

Now I know you’re looking at the photo and thinking, there’s an awful lot of footprints for an almost deserted beach, but it is also the main thoroughfare for the local cattle to transfer from one field to another!

At one point there is a promontory dividing Fermoyle beach from the inlet to Cloghane and the rocks come all the way up to a low cliff. You can see it here shown at high tide on a google maps image.

Fermoyle and Cloghane

Newbie and I headed off in front and picked out a very circuitous route that avoided most of the rocks and boulders. Ger and Misty followed on (Ger tends to be more of a passenger than a rider but he and Misty get along very well!).

Fermoyle Beach, Co Kerry….last of the rocky bit!

We continued down the beach (the tide was waaay out) for a bit before turning for home.

Now Misty and Ger were in the lead and here’s my puzzle. Ger had dropped the reins completely and was letting Misty find the way. She followed our original hoof prints in reverse and took the exact circuitous route, almost hoofprint for hoofprint, back to Fermoyle beach…..How did she do that?. Was it visual? Did she smell the hoofprints? Or was it from memory? Whichever it was, we were both pretty amazed.

This time it was Misty’s turn for a paddle on the beach…. We’re very lucky in where we live in that the beach beside us is shingly and rocky to mid-tide but sandy at very low tides which makes for a wonderful playground for horses. Because there are so many glorious sandy beaches near us in Kerry, only local people use our beach and so I can safely play with my horses at liberty!

Misty is now a mature 20 years old. She has been in our family since she was a 2 year-old and has taught several people to ride (including me and my three, now grown-up, children, as well as Marte’s daughter and son). She’s spent the last few years mostly in Marte’s, having a pretty easy life!

Michaela hugs Misty with a ‘move away’ feel

Misty does know about mats and standing (being a cob/irish draft) is one of the things she does best! So mats can be used to build patience but also to build enthusiasm and movement. Michaela worked with Misty and multiple mats. These mats were scattered pretty randomly around the top half of the arena. Misty was perfectly happy to go and stand on any mat! Alex wanted her to move off with a proper bend and flexibility in her body so to get this MIchaela hugged her! This was a hug with a feel of movement in a direction away from Michaela. When Misty adjusted her balance..Click and Treat (CT).

Michaela moves into the space to treat

Michaela then moved into the space that was opened up by Misty’s change of balance as she reached to give her a treat. The hugs were repeated until Misty was bent in the direction of the next mat, when Michaela picked up the lead and moved off with her. The amount of bend needed depended on the location of the next mat and can be made more or less by the choice of mat to move to. Initially they chose mats that were easy to reach with a little bend but as Misty softened and became more flexible, Michaela (and the audience) could pick mats that required more bend to reach.

A hug towards Michaela!

As well as moving away from hugs, Michaela also asked Misty to move towards her with a hug. As Misty shifted her balance, Michaela moved back to allow Misty to bend more towards her.

In this case feeding is back further as Michael encourages Misty to keep the bend..

Misty gets her CT

In all of the pictures where Misty is on the mat, the lead rope has been thrown casually over her back. This then becomes a cue to stand and wait.

In the next sequence of pictures, Michaela sets up the turn towards her with a couple of hugs and then lifts the rope off Misty’s back as they are ready to move onto the next mat.

Setting up the bend

Improving the bend

Ready to move off

Starting leg flexions

To make the mat an even better place to be, we can add in other requests and put them on a high rate of reinforcement. During this clinic we used leg flexions in order to achieve this…. starting with the front feet.

Here Misty is barely lifting a front foot but as the session progressed she lifted it higher. As ever, successive approximations were used so for the initial try, CT, but with each ask, a little more is required. As she lifted higher Michaela could then support her foot by just holding the tip of her toe and hold her other hand up as a target for Misty’s knee.

Misty targets Michaela’s hand with her knee

Over the course of the clinic this improved hugely. Initially there was a lot of wiggling of her leg, but Misty learned to find the target and hold her knee there. Gradually Michaela changed her cue so that she could ask for the lift from touching the shoulder…This is needed to be able to transfer to asking under saddle.

The gallery below shows hind foot lifts….Click on a picture to enlarge it.

Misty start a hind foot lift

Much better lift with the foot coming forward

Michaela use her foot as a target for MIsty’s foot

This way she can move the foot further forward

Great for everyone’s balance!!

And so on to some ridden work:

Michaela slides down the reins to ask for bend

Coming to a point of contact on the reins, Michaela waits for a response

Michaela releases on the give

Another nice soft bend released

Misty starts to head towards the next mat

Striding out! You can see that MIchaela has completely released the reins to allow Misty to go to the mat freely.

CT !!

Sliding to a point of contact

Another nice bend

A huge benefit of this clinic for Misty was that she learned to move very smartly from one mat to the next with huge enthusiasm. As she has been ridden primarily for the past three years by Marte’s now 5 year-old daughter, she has really only been pottering!! Her nature is that shes a quiet slow-moving cob….ideal for giving confidence to young children. In her earlier years she was an excellent show-jumper and so it was great to see her move quickly again and clearly loving it..

Another advantage is that at 20 years of age she now has a level of arthritis, so the leg lifts and flexions are a great way for Misty to build strength and keep her active.

As ever, when watching the clinic, I’m not very focused on taking photos so they’re not always the best or even very good moments that are shown here.

And finally…..I just love this picture of Michaela and Misty…even from this angle you can see that they are both focused on each other.

It’s wonderful when you have extra people around with cameras who are willing to take pictures when you work. We have just had an amazing clinic with Alexandra Kurland in Kerry and there were several photographers on hand. On day one, after a lovely ride on Newbie, we ended up with him standing on a mat. One of the things that I now take for granted with my clicker trained horse is that he will stand and wait patiently while I perform whatever tasks are necessary around him. In this case it was simply dismounting and putting the saddle away but when seeing the series of photos, made me think, once again, about how effective clicker training is at producing really well behaved horses!

Alexandra Kurland is giving a three day clinic near Tralee, Co Kerry Ireland…why not take advantage of Ryanair flights to Kerry airport (30 min away) to come and have a wonderful break in Kerry while learning new skills.

Learn how to communicate clearly with your horse, solve common problems, improve performance and build a great partnership!

This 3 day clinic starts with introductions on the evening of Thurs 30th May, followed by 3 full clinic days from 31st May to 2nd June

There are limited horse places available on the clinic. Book early to avoid disappointment. Auditor/Without horse places are available. Everyone who attends is a full participant and will have hands-on learning throughout the day.

Alexandra Kurland is the foremost equine clicker trainer in the world and is the author of a range of books and DVDs.